‘The Boy and the Heron’: Hayao Miyazaki’s Tribute to Ghibli and Mothers Premieres Today in Ecuador

The movie that no one expected for a while, because its creator had said he would retire (they go several times now), recently took the golden globe for best animated film, was nominated for the Critics Choice Awards and await the decision of the Academy Awards.

It premieres today in Ecuador as The boy and the heronby Hayao Miyazaki, with a duration of 124 minutes. The original title would be translated as “How do you live?”, the same question that the mother of the main character, the boy Mahito, leaves him in a book.

He only knows about it several years after her death, which occurred when the hospital where she was being cared caught fire. Mahito is injured while trying to save her, and that incident changes him a quiet and observant child.

By the time he finds the book, he has moved with his father to the countryside, near the prosperous factory his family owns and the old house where his new wife, Natsuko, who is pregnant, is also waiting for them.

The house is next to a tower, an area closed off because the neighbors think there is a curse on it. Even more than the tower, Mahito is concerned about someone who dares him to go there: a large gray heron that is not afraid to enter the house and chase him. A fight begins between the boy and the heron, until the former decides to settle it, grabs a stick and goes after his enemy.

Anyone who has followed Studio Ghibli’s catalog will recognize the brand from other films: the fire of The grave of the fireflies (1988), the tempestuous sea of Pony (2008), the forest of Princess Mononoke (1997), the colorful banquets of Ghostly away (2001), Howl’s Gates to Other Worlds (The moving castle, 2004). You don’t have to see them, but it certainly enhances the experience.

In The boy and the heron, Miyazaki taps into the curiosity of a mother who wonders how her son will live after she is gone. and finds them once again in an impossible, unstable world, created by magic and capable of being destroyed with a breath, where the most vulnerable are protected by grandmothers and mothers.

The women are re-imagined by the director as resistant and protective people, who become vulnerable and untouchable when they reach the mysterious stage of motherhood, but emerge stronger and braver than before. Even monsters can’t handle it.

In that universe Yes, there are dangerous creatures, but they reached that state because they were forced and changed by a human (a recurring theme with Miyazaki). Young Mahito, although not the culprit, is a descendant of the one who caused the problem, and takes it upon himself to do something for them.

Mahito’s father, on the other hand, has been given the weaknesses of the average adult: he is rich, physically strong, knows how to use weapons, has a good grounding in the real world, and yet he fails to save his first wife. , his second wife and the unborn baby.

The director has other plans for them. He brings them together and lets them take on their own salvation.

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Miyazaki, already winner of an Oscar in 2002 Chihiro and another in 2014 for the professional career, was able to get a third statue thanks to his determination to continue working in the tiring animation industry. This would be his last film, but in 2023 he admitted that he already had another project in mind.

The co-founder, producer and close friend of the director Toshio Suzuki summed it up this way in a recent interview: “He thinks about his next project every day and I can’t stop him; In fact, I’ve given up. I’m no longer trying to discourage him, even though he made a failed film. The only thing in life he enjoys is working.” That’s the way Miyazaki lives.